The former Kroger grocery store on Benton Road, which has remained vacant for more than two years, will soon have new life with the opening of Bossier City’s first Planet Fitness.

The fitness center is hopeful to open in the property at 801 Benton Road on June 5, said Ryan Laux, Planet Fitness district manager for Shreveport and Bossier City.

“We seem to be pretty close to schedule on that right now,” Laux said.

The property has been vacant since November 2015, when the Kroger store there relocated to the newer Kroger Marketplace location on Airline Highway.

After Kroger closed, the City of Bossier City sold the property for $1.6 million to Sutherlands Express LLC, which shared its plans to develop a multi-tenant retail shopping center anchored with a Planet Fitness.

Planet Fitness will be in part of the building, with 18,926 square feet remaining vacant for a potential commercial retailer to lease.

The Bossier City Council approved an ordinance authorizing the property sale in March 2017.

“The project will provide 20-30 new permanent jobs, 50-100 temporary construction jobs, with an anticipated membership for Planet Fitness of 7,000 members in the Bossier City area,” the ordinance said. “Sutherlands Express will invest approximately $3 million in renovations to the building to bring it up to existing building codes.”

Bossier City Chief Administrative Officer Pam Glorioso previously told The Times that the city had owned the building since 2004, when it purchased the property from Kroger in correlation with the Benton Road overpass construction. At that point, Kroger became a tenant to the city.

After Kroger vacated the property in 2015, the city had a deal on the table with Brookshire Grocery Company to bring a Super 1 Foods grocery store to the building, but that plan fell through, Glorioso said.

Staff with Planet Fitness will be in the parking lot of the Bossier City location from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Mondays-Fridays and from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturdays-Sundays to sign up new members and explain what the center offers.